Stranger in the night
by lionversusbear
Summary: Sirius Black, recent Azkaban escapee, searches to reunite with his godson, but encounters his uncle Vernon en route.
1. Chapter 1

Life on Privet Drive had always been tame. Controversy outside the world of which lawn fertilizer you chose to grow your tulips with was seldom, if ever, heard. However, the residents did, every now and then, let down their hair come night time. By doing just that - letting down their hair. The women carefully removed the bobby bins from their buns and placed them neatly on the countertop, while the men took off their toupees, settling themselves down for the evening news with a glass of scotch so old it was legible for a senior citizen's discount. Vernon Dursley was doing the same. The frustration he had bottled up from that day's incident between a mustard dispenser and his tie was slowly fading away as his stiff drink began to make itself comfortable inside him, putting up heavy opaque drapes and turning on the mood light, swaying softly to adult contemporary records. Vernon quickly cleared his throat and shook himself free of this thought. The last thing he wanted was to feel...frisky. He glanced over at his wife. Like most nights, she had placed herself by the window, looking particularly like an overgrown fern with teeth, peering into neighboring dens, hoping to catch couples in the midst of - well, anything really. Like most nights, nothing was out of the ordinary. Even Ms. Figg, who regularly dressed her cats up in ball gowns and danced around the house with them, sat quietly by the television, a ball of yarn and knitting needles in her lap. Life on Privet Drive had always been tame, and will always continue to be tame. Should anything out of the ordinary occur, Petunia Dursley would have been the first to notice.

Then again...there was one thing th-

No.

Petunia quickly snapped the curtains shut, smoothed out her dressed and kissed her husband on the forehead, bidding him good night. Vernon mumbled something about gardening sheers and plaid suits and slowly drifted to sleep, drooling occasionally on the new throw pillows.

As Vernon dreamed of a quiet life with his wife and child, and only that, a lurking lurker lurked in the darkness. Though Petunia's watchful stare had burned it's way through the entire street, pointing out leaves that had changed direction in the wind, she had failed to pick up one tiny, minute, unobtrusive, negligible detail: the giant, disheveled, growling and foaming at the mouth black dog that had been staring back at her for the past week. This, Petunia had overlooked. The dog, in it's best impression of a floating shadow, attempted to glide effortless towards the other side of the street and lay still beside the garbage bins. Unfortunately, because it was a poor impersonator and nothing like a floating shadow, it made quite a bit of noise by knocking over the cans, scaring a street cat, howling from stepping in what may have very well been creamed cabbage, and only slightly roused Vernon from his slumber. The dog grunted with impatience.

Standing on it's hind legs and pressing against the window, the dog bore a striking resemblance to a man trying to open a window by leaning his weight on it. The resemblance was so uncanny because the dog, in fact, was a man trying to open a window by leaning his weight on it. The transformation only took a moment, and the man, in a physical state far worse then when he had been in his canine form, peered into the house, looking around for moving shapes. When he believed there to be none, he slid through the window frame and, having caught sight of a rather squishy and comfortable looking bean bag chair, sat down. Though the man was inconceivably tired and took great relief from the relaxing state of being seated, the bean bag chair did not reciprocate these feelings. The reason being that this particular bean bag chair upon which the wretched intruder had decided to rest his weary body was not actually a bean bag chair but rather Vernon Dursley, who, due to a rather traumatic incident as a young child and a general human dislike for being mistaken for seating furniture - or any furniture at all for that matter, did not appreciate being sat on. His mind immediately thought to politely ask the strange man to kindly remove himself from off his person. His body disagreed. It thought a more appropriate response would be to jerk suddenly and shout out in surprise and fear. The dispute was brief but, in the end, Vernon's mind agreed with his body and decided a reflex would be the way to go. The strange man's reflexes, on the other hand, were far more responsive and quick (for a moment, he pondered if I shouldn't have been a cat instead of a dog), and had immobilized Vernon before he could get up and shout for help.

Vernon's eyes were as wide as open bear traps, glaring at the man with terror and revulsion. He felt a blade pressing sharply against his neck, and had he not recognized the man, he would have had no problem shaking him off and pinning him to the ground in return for his figure was so skeletal and frail he knew he stood no chance. But he knew who he was, and what he was capable of and therefore whimpered silently into the hand that was covering up his mouth. Trying to maintain his menacing posture and sneer was proving to be quite difficult, as Vernon's twitching mustache was ticklish and wet with tears and bogey, so the man quickly asked in a hoarse voice:

"Where is he?"

"Mmph fppfhp pfhmmdh!"

"Pardon?"

"Phmf pfhwhw fpfhfkjfh!"

The man removed his hand from Vernon's mouth, subtly wiping it against the tattered remains of his pants.

"Could you repeat that, I didn't understand."

"I can't ruddy well answer if you've got your hand covering my mouth, can I?"

The blade dug deeper into his skin.

"WHERE IS HE?"

Vernon tried to answer, but his words were clouded by hiccoughs and weeps.

"Do you know who I am?"

The man's face was taught with rage, and even though he looked as if were about to collapse at any moment, his eyes shined so brilliantly that they shook Vernon back to reality.

"Yes...that man...on the tele...escaped...that murderer, Sirius Black!"

"Good, now tell me where the boy is. Where is Harry Potter?"

"H-H-H-He's gone!"

"Gone?! WHERE?!"

"Away, with...those red-haired freaks of his!"

Sirius let go of Vernon suddenly, who fell to the floor with such force it knocked over a vase and spilled unto Vernon's lap.

"He's not here then?"

Vernon shook his head violently.

"Oh, sorry. I guess I'll be on my way."

All the anger in Sirius' face had been replaced with childish disappointment. He dragged himself outside, and with a loud pop, vanished into thin air. Vernon picked himself up and stared out the window to where his raggedy assailant stood but a moment ago. Amidst the torrent of emotions hurling themselves around inside Vernon's mind, only one was particularly bizarre. He replayed the scene in his mind. His power, his intensity, his eyes...his moustache. Vernon thought about the first time he met Petunia and s-

"VERNON ARE YOU SINGING?!"

Startled, he quickly turned around to see his wife in a nightgown, her hair in rollers, staring at him perplexedly.

"What? No, of course not I was -"

"What are y- did you...WET yourself?"

He looked down to see a large water stain on the front of his trousers, from when the vase had spilled. He considered telling Petunia what had happened. An escaped convict had broken into their home, threatened his life, and left suddenly when he learned that the boy was nowhere inside.

"Yes...I did. It w- a bad dream, yes."

The blood drained from Petunia face, which slumped the same way her body did unto the nearest ottoman.

"Petunia, I -"

"DAD WERE YOU SINGING?"!

"SHUT UP, DUDELY! GO BACK TO SLEEP!"

Vernon stared at his wife, who did not dare look him in the eye. She simply stood up, flattened her gown, and went back upstairs. Tomorrow morning, she would pretend nothing strange had ever happened, and perhaps nothing indeed. What on Earth would a ravenous killer want with the Potter child? Perhaps he knew what the boy truly was and would rid Vernon forever of the abomination. Vernon quietly crept upstairs to bed, smiling deeply while he dreamt of a waxy skinned man who would set him free.


	2. Chapter 2

"Didn't you get my letter, Sirius?"

After having spent twelve years tormented in Azkaban, living as an escaped dog and feeding off rats for months, the sight of Mrs Weasley's cooking had miraculously expanded the size of Sirius' mouth, so much so that he had stuffed it to the point of only being able to pronounce the letter m.

"Maybe you should swallow first."

After Sirius' near death experience from a failed attempt at swallowing his body weight in roasted duck, and after two-thirds of the Weasley family had calmed down to a level of merely hysterical sobbing, Harry learned that Sirius had not, in fact, received his letter clearly indicating that he will be staying at the Burrow for the remainder of the summer in light of the Quidditch World Cup.

For the first time in her life, Mrs. Weasley had to take away Sirius' plate from him, no longer allowing him any more food, for fear of him killing himself from the gorge. Harry had grown quite impatient from waiting to hear Sirius' story, and between the choking incident and the tantrum and death threats he had thrown after his plate was removed from the table, his patience had grown thinner than Sirius while locked in his prison cell.

"But I don't understand why you went over to Privet Drive to begin with, you could have been seen!"

"Seen? Hardly. That aunt of yours stared right at me for about a week and gave less notice in me than when your neighbour's wheelbarrow tipped over."

"Well it was an old wheelbarrow."

"A very old wheelbarrow indeed, I'm surprised they're still using it."

"Now what exactly DOES a wheelbarrow do?"

At the topic of muggle tools, Arthur Weasley seemed to have suddenly appeared on the couch between Sirius and Harry.

"Dad, I think Sirius' encounter with Harry's uncle is a little more important now."

"Oh, yes, of course. Quite right, Ronald. Go on, but you must tell me more of this wheelbarrow later on."

"I can get you one."

"Can you?"

"DAD."

"Sorry!"

Sirius leaned back in his seat. The soft plush of the thick cushions felt so calming to him. He imagined Vernon's -

"Are you alright, Sirius?"

Sirius caught hold oh himself gently stroking the cushion, while a small pool of drool was forming on the barely-definable remains of his shirt.

"Now that you mention it, no I'm not. Someone took away my treacle tart before I had finished it."

"YOU NEARLY CHOKED TO DEATH, WHAT WOULD YOU HAVE DONE?"

"I would never have taken it away. I WOULD HAVE DIED!"

Harry and Ron exchanged a glance, knowing full well that between mistaking James Potter for a piece of tart, and going starry-eyed at the mention of of Vernon Dursley, something was deeply the matter with Sirius. Arthur noticed the scene had become concerning, so he led Sirius off the sofa, and into the guest room where he could finally rest. Off in the distance, Harry and Ron could hear Arthur muttering about pillows and wheelbarrows.

"What's gotten into Sirius, you reckon?"

"Dementors."

"No, I mean other than that. He looks odd."

"He looks odd because Dementors have been eating away at his soul for years."

Much like Sirius' restlessness, this didn't sit well with Harry. He knew something strange had been going on but was unsure what it was. Even though he'd only known Sirius for a few short weeks, and spent most of those weeks believing Sirius was a cold blooded murderer, he somehow knew this was odd behavior afoot. Either way, there were far more important things to worry about.

"Is there any tart left?"

"Tell me more about the Muggle house, Sirius."

"Arthur, the tale of the fallen wheelbarrow can wait for the morning, I'm tired."

"No, I mean - oh, but must it? Can't you tell me anything?"

It might have been the fact that Sirius was an animagi and had spent so much time as a dog, or that his body had gone into such a state of exhaustion that he had lost any conscious control of his muscles and his face had simply sunken that way, but his ability to produce pleading puppy eyes immediately melted Arthur's ardent Muggle fixation.

"What I meant, Sirius, is what happened with Harry's Uncle? Was magic involved? Do we need to send Ministry Officials over?"

The thought of other men storming into Vernon's home in the middle of the night shook Sirius to full alert. He lunged at Arthur and grabbed the lapels of his cloak. He spoke curtly and with tremendous restraint.

"Don't. You. Dare."

Realizing what he had done, he quickly let go of Arthur and tried to brush the wrinkles out, where his hands had nearly ripped the cloth.

"I'm sorry, Arthur. I don't know what's gotten into me. That man...Vernon...the thought of him. Well, it does things to me."

"Hmm, yes, I've heard stories from Harry. He sounds like an awful man."

It's a good thing that Sirius was lost in the thought of feeling Vernon's evening stubble brushing against his hand as he held the blade to his quivering neck. Had he heard what Arthur said, he would have lunged at him and grabbed the lapels of his cloak, speaking curtly and with tremendous restraint. Then, realizing what he had done, he would have quickly let go of Arthur and tried to brush the wrinkles out, where his hands had nearly ripped the cloth. But he had no intention of repeating that process again.

"Well, goodnight, Sirius. We've got a big day tomorrow world. Quidditch Cup preparations and all."

Yes, Sirius thought. Tomorrow will be a big day indeed.


End file.
